Inside the Ring, France Dominates the UK

COVENTRY, England, May 21 — Forget the crowd trouble, the rain and
the FA Cup final. The real story yesterday was the ten fights on
show. Leaving aside the disturbance at the end, this was one of the
most enjoyable events I've ever attended.

The Skydome arena looks and feels like a warehouse. It's big and
empty with a high metal ceiling and as I arrived at the venue I
witnessed its reconstruction from ice hockey venue to MMA dream.
The sheets of wood laid over the ice did not disguise the cold but
as soon as the crowd was all inside and the adrenaline was pumping
we didn't really notice such minor inconveniences as frostbite.

All it seemed to take was the erection of a cage, some curtains and
some spotlights; and as the ambient light dimmed and the crowd
began to arrive, we had us an MMA venue. With the atmosphere
enthusiastic and electric, I felt excited and ready to go.

Biased as this may be, my top performers on the night were both
British. Danny Batten did
what no other English featherweight could do and defeated Emmanuel Fernandez in
spectacular fashion — and by submission, no less. Dan "Fearless"
Hardy, despite losing, displayed the sort of grit, determination
and heart that just can't be taught. Hardy may have lost but in the
eyes of everbody I spoke to, this loss may have just catapulted the
Nottingham fighter into stardom.

As far as the French go, the most memorable performer for me was
Bendy Casimir, who fought a kingly fight against a tough and
determined Dave Swann.

The final score was 7-2 France.

In the main event of the evening, local kickboxing hero Barrington Patterson faced
off against French grappler, Marc Emmanuel. Patterson received a
massive cheer as he made his way to the ring, but even a partisan
crowd was not enough to swing this bout in the big man's favor.
Emmanuel was dominant from start to finish, eating a couple of
shots from Patterson before taking the Englishman down to the
canvas. The fight was stopped almost immediately as the French
fighter was admonished by the referee for the use of an illegal
downward elbow.

The fighters were restarted on their feet but Patterson was never
in this. Emmanuel took the English fighter straight back to the
canvas and mounted him. Patterson, who is clearly a novice on the
ground, did nothing other than lie flat on his back and hold
Emmanuel's head down, clinging to his opponent for dear life. This
tactic would prove to be nothing more than a stay of execution and
Emmanuel punished Patterson's ribs until the referee stood them up
for inactivity. As soon as the fight was restarted it hit the
ground again, with Emmanuel suplexing his opponent to the canvas
and launching a barrage of punches. One of these hit Patterson
clean on the chin and the Englishman was knocked out. This was a
great stoppage by the referee, who seemed to be the only person
immediately aware of the knockout. Patterson stayed down for around
three minutes, being tended to by paramedics, but was able to exit
the cage under his own strength.

In the night's only cage-based controversy, Matt Ewin retained his belt after his
fight with Damien Riccio
was ruled a no contest. Despite an early attack from Riccio which
almost resulted in him winning by rear naked choke, Ewin was able
to reverse the situation and put Riccio down on his back and open
up with his trademark ground and pound. Towards the end of the
first round, Ewin was even able to take Riccio's back, but he too
failed to find the finishing choke.

The second round opened with an exchange of low kicks and then a
huge slam from Ewin. Riccio managed to work his way back to his
feet, only to be taken down again. At some point in this action
Ewin suffered a cut and as the French official, Loic Pora,
separated the two fighters it was obvious that the Englishman was
bleeding from a wound above his right eye. The match was stopped
and Ewin's cut treated. With the blood staunched, the fighters were
restarted in the same position but scarcely a minute had passed
before the referee stopped the fight again. Despite later claims
that the referee was only stopping the fight for a second cut
inspection, Ewin was incensed and angry, accusing Riccio of using
his finger to intentionally re-open the cut. Both corners made
their way into the cage and as the wrangling continued, video
evidence was reviewed.

After around thirty minutes, the decision was made to rule the
fight a No Contest since it was not deemed to be appropriate for
the belt to chance hands on the strength of a controversial cut. A
rematch was promised and these two will face off again in the near
future.

There had been a lot of groundwork in the previous fights, so the
presence of a bout between Mike Bisping and Cyrille Diabate under hybrid
kickboxing rules was a welcome respite for the crowd. This was an
extremely even fight between two very good light heavyweight
strikers. Throughout the entire contest it was the shorter Bisping
who was coming forwards, looking to land power shots and
combinations that would knock his opponent down. Diabate, for his
part, worked a cautious game, using his greater reach to pick his
opponent off with jabs, knees and kicks. It was close but in my
opinion Bisping edged the first three rounds through being more
aggressive and scoring a knock down in the second round. The judges
saw it differently, however, and a majority draw was scored after
three rounds, meaning that the bout would go to a sudden victory
fourth round. Bisping was gassed by this point and Diabate did
enough in this round to be awarded the win via a unanimous judge's
decision.

In what can only be described as complete and utter domination,
Antonio "Junior" Silva took his second win under professional MMA
rules and reinforced his claim as a very special talent. "Junior"
is huge — 145-kgs of purely bad intent — and he uses all that force
with devastating results. The fight opened with big bombs being
thrown by Silva on the feet, and Tchinda, his opponent, retreating
under the barrage. After a takedown and some heavy ground and pound
from "Junior", the fight was stopped due to Tchinda having lost his
mouth guard. As soon as the fighters returned to their feet, the
Brazilian charged again and this time Tchinda had no way out.
Trapped against the fence and with nowhere to go to escape the
heavy strikes, Tchinda must have been glad when the referee stepped
in after 3:03 of the first round.

Gregory
Bouchelaghem defeated Ross
Pointon by rear-naked choke in the sixth match of the night.
The Englishman was game and aggressive but Pointon's power was
dealt with and trumped by Bouchelaghem's skill on the ground.
Following an exchange of takedowns, Pointon was reversed from the
top position to the bottom after missing a keylock. With the
Frenchman mounted on top of him, Pointon turned his back in an
attempt to escape, gifting his opponent with the opportunity to
finish him, which he did after 4:10 of the first round.

One of the most spectacular performances of the night came from
Danny Batten, from the Ze Marcello/BTT camp, as he finally achieved
the unachievable and defeated Emmanuel Fernandez. Batten fought the
fight of his life, upsetting Fenandez with his low kick before the
Frenchman shot in and took his opponent to the floor. The rest of
the round took place on the ground with Fernandez on top and Batten
on the bottom. Against expectation, most of the work was coming
from the Englishman, who kept his opponent busy with attempted
armbars, triangles and omoplatas. Fernandez did a good job of
avoiding these and managed some light ground and pound, but nothing
seemed to bother the snake-hipped Englishman.

The second round opened in similar fashion, with Fernandez shooting
for the takedown and Batten immediately opening up with his arsenal
of submissions. After 2:18 minutes of the round, Fernandez finally
succumbed to a tight triangle choke, leading to moving scenes as an
overjoyed Batten celebrated and an ecstatic crowd basked in the UK
team's first victory of the night.

In an equally incredible display of skill, athleticism and
determination, David Baron
submitted Dan "Fearless" Hardy with a triangle choke. This was an
absolute war from start to finish, with both fighters displaying
the sort of tenacity that lesser men can only aspire to. The first
round belonged to Baron, whose powerful takedowns and incessant
submission attempts kept Hardy, the striker, out of his game.
Hardy, for his part, could have tapped at a number of instances. I
was sure that at one point his arm was going to break but somehow,
some way, the Englishman gutted it out and kept coming.

The second round brought more of the same, but with Hardy managing
to stamp his authority more and more on the Frenchman who must have
been wondering what the hell he needed to do to keep his opponent
down. Hardy landed some big shots in this round, pummeling and
punishing his opponent whenever he got a respite from Baron's
quick-fire submissions.

It was in the third round that Hardy finally succumbed, and what a
pity it was too. This had been the English fighter's best round,
and he seemed the more confident as he dropped shots on Baron from
the top. Whether it was fatigue or carelessness, the end result was
that Hardy was finally caught in a tight triangle choke and, this
time, not even the "Fearless" one could get out, tapping at 3:10 of
the third round.

Jim Wallhead has an
impressive range of hip throws and he used them to entertaining
effect in his match against the Frenchman, Boris Jonstomp.
Unfortunately for Wallhead, his throws could not save him from the
slick ground skills of his opponent, who weathered the early storm
to take the Englishman's back and force him to tap out to a rear
naked choke after 4:20 of the first round.

Bendy Casimir unleashed a
torrent of aggression and fury at his opponent in the second fight
of the night. Casimir was extremely impressive, getting the best of
the early stand-up exchanges before executing some fast takedowns
and continuing the assault with some fierce ground and pound. Dave
Swann, to his credit, weathered the storm like a warrior, even
managing to reverse positions a couple of times but it was all to
no avail. Casimir secured the side choke and Swann was left with no
option but to tap out after 4:07 of the first round.

Chris "The Freak" Freeborn should be illegal. The guy is only 21
years old, but has already fought more times than most UK-based
fighters barring Paul Jenkins. On this occasion Freeborn cheerfully
stepped up at 5pm on the day of the fight. Shortly after 6pm, he
was standing in the middle of the cage, face to face with Mohamed
El-Aouji. Despite the lack of preparation, Freeborn gave El-Aouji
an excellent run for his money. The Englishman clearly wanted no
part of the Frenchman's stand-up game, and worked to put the
Frenchman on the ground. Unfortunately for Freeborn, El-Aouji was
to prove his equal in that arena also, cinching on a tight triangle
choke just as it looked like Freeborn was starting to take the
upper hand, forcing the frighteningly brave Englishman to tap.